


Primrose and Poplar

by misanthrobot (augmentalize)



Category: Pyre (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Kissing, M/M, Makeup, Post-Canon, Reconciliation, Warm and Fuzzy Feelings, Xenobiology
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-21
Updated: 2018-02-21
Packaged: 2019-03-22 02:02:00
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13753911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/augmentalize/pseuds/misanthrobot
Summary: He never thought himself one to fall asleep in the middle of writing, but Volfred supposes that he's getting on in years. He just wishes that he hadn't dropped face first onto his speech while the ink was still wet. Thankfully, he has Oralech to help with the stains, the man already more than familiar with Sandalwood's routine, even if it has been a while since they've had the luxury of being so close.





	Primrose and Poplar

Volfred wakes when he feels the soft  _ skritch-skritch-skritch _ of claws on the back of his neck, eyes opening blearily as he pushes himself up from his writing desk. His eyes linger on the arm he can see, draped in white raiments still, and then trail up to elbow then shoulder and finally  _ his _ face. Oralech.

“You fell asleep at your desk again,” he says, and Volfred slowly pushes himself up and back to take a peek under his desk. The basin he had been soaking his roots in is empty, the water having long since been absorbed while he worked and then slept. He remembers that it had been cool and relaxing…

“My apologies, I had intended to be there to greet you when you returned from the Bloodborder,” says Volfred. Oralech snorts and shakes his head, but carefully. The set of horns at the top of his head grow smaller as months pass, but the large ones that curl in on themselves are still imposing enough that he has to be very careful. He moves from leaning his hip against Volfred’s desk to half-sitting on it, more than willing to press into the other man’s space.

“You ought to apologize to your writing instead.” 

Volfred looks at Oralech in the dim candlelight, catching the slightest glimpse of a smirk on his face, cruel smugness offset by genuine amusement. He would say something of it, but he can still feel that fond scratching at the back of his neck and it’s driving him to distraction. He looks down at his papers--a new speech to call the citizens of the Sahrian Union to attend schools that their new government is setting up, schools built to encourage literacy among the populace after so long without. It had taken some time to get started, to find the right words to try and coax a population to accept a practice that had, for as long as many of them could remember, resulted in a most cruel punishment.

It is, almost to the word, entirely smudged.

Volfred blinks once, then again, slowly. Oralech chuckles, a rolling and rumbling sound, as Volfred touches his face. It’s the worst case scenario when the tips of his fingers come back dry.

“ _ Damn _ .” 

At that, Oralech actually laughs.  _ Laughs _ . Volfred would like to be insulted, but it’s been so long since he heard that sound that he finds himself more than a little gobsmacked. It’s different from before, rougher and more rasping, but it’s still deep and rich and a song for aching ears. He looks up at the other man with something akin to fascination, then remembers he’s the one being laughed at and scowls. 

“Don’t pout,” says Oralech after his laughter has quieted. “It’s hardly a look that works with your features. Come--” He pushes off the desk, standing on his hooves again and reaching a hand out to Volfred. “--I have a stain remover in my medical bay that works perfectly well on Saps. We can clean you up before anyone sees the mess you’ve made of yourself.”

Volfred grumbles, but slips his hand into Oralech’s and tries to tamp down the nervous, youthful excitement he feels. He is a grown Sap, and he refuses to act like an enamored sapling in the face of simple physical contact. Even if it is from Oralech. Even if this is the first time he’s held the other man’s hand since they reconciled all those months ago.

He’s short enough that the trunks of his legs dangle off the gurney in the medbay as he watches Oralech bustle around his workspace looking for the stain remover. He wonders, in the not-so-silence of small glass vials clinking around, if the Reader ever got his letter of gratitude. They had done so much for so little, in the end. They reunited him with his kindred spirit at a time where he had come to terms with never being able to reconcile with Oralech again. 

He hopes they are doing well.

“--fred. Volfred.” He blinks, shaking away the thoughts as Oralech calls for him.

“Sorry, yes?”

Oralech holds up a round glass bottle, a light purple liquid sloshing around inside. When he pulls the glass stopper, a sharp smell floods the room and it’s enough to make Volfred wilt a little. He dislikes stain remover as a general rule, hates the way it strips his bark just slightly. Superseding his dislike for it, however, is his dislike for being embarrassed, especially when he has a country to run.

“I’ll need to apply it over your whole face so that everything looks more or less even,” says Oralech. “Though this will remove the embellishments to your lips and eyes.”

“A pity,” says Volfred dryly. “They accentuate my best features.”

“Agreed, for the most part.” Oralech doesn’t flinch, doesn’t flush, doesn’t give any sort of hint that he understands the gravity his casual statement holds. All he does is carefully soak a washcloth with the stain remover. Volfred, to his credit, sits up a little straighter and tries not to place too much meaning in a simple agreement. However, he  _ does _ flinch when Oralech brings the soaked cloth close to his face, and only stills when the other man coaxes his chin up with a curled finger, then holds Volfred’s jaw in his palm. 

“Hold still, damn you,” says Oralech, in a tone that Volfred has come to recognize as his Doctor’s Voice. It’s soft yet stern, irritated yet with an underlying compassion. Volfred sighs, half in relief and half in resignation, and allows his eyelids to flutter shut.

Oralech works slowly and steadily, wiping off the ink that has stained his face with long and steady swipes of the cloth. Volfred twists away once or twice, but Oralech coaxes him back with a whispered ‘ _ shhh... _ ’ and gets right back to work. After several minutes that seem to go on forever, he pulls back and takes the now ink-stained cloth with him, and Volfred is allowed to open his eyes. His face feels odd, tingly and light. He reaches up to touch it, hums thoughtfully, then looks up at Oralech as he puts away the bottle and throws the rag into a pile of similar utility cloths that need to be boiled and washed and dried.

“Do you have a mirror?” Volfred asks, plucking a few leaves from his collar. “And a mortar and pestle.”

“I would be a fairly poor doctor if I lacked either,” says Oralech, and pulls the first item from a drawer and the second from a cupboard. Volfred hops down from where he was seated, slipping gracefully over to the counter and dropping his leaves into the mortar, grinding them up into a paste with practiced ease. Without needing to be told, Oralech hands him a tongue depressor and holds up the mirror as Volfred carefully stains his lips back to their more flattering green, then does the same for the lids of his eyes.

“Dashing as always,” says Oralech, putting the pestle and mortar in the sink and the hand mirror back in it’s drawer. Volfred turns to him and makes to say something, but Oralech is close and tall and giving him such a  _ look _ .

“It’s going to be bitter,” he warns, even as a jittering ball of excitement coalesces in his chest. Oralech hums and shrugs, leaning down.

“Then it will be a familiar feeling.”

Their lips meet and the leaves on Volfred’s collar rustle as Oralech settles clawed hands on his waist. Volfred lets his arms rest over the other man’s shoulders in turn. He’s pleasantly surprised at how, in spite of horns and hooves, claws and muscle, Oralech’s lips are now pleasantly soft in contrast to the rest of him. When they pull back, Oralech licks his lips on instinct. He grimaces, and it’s Volfred’s turn to chuckle.

“I warned you. I’ve warned you every time. It is always bitter when it’s fresh, my love.”

“And when have I ever listened or cared?”


End file.
